thoughts (and links) of a retired "social scientist" as he tries to make sense of the world.....

what you get here

This is not a blog which expresses instant opinions on current events. It rather uses incidents, books (old and new), links and papers as jumping-off points for some reflections about our social endeavours.

So old posts are as good as new! And lots of useful links!

Saturday, January 31, 2015

Bulgaria
– by virtue of its size and Cyrillic script - gets a raw deal on the internet. To
help enlarge its profile I therefore offer this E-book of 100 pages - Bulgarian
Explorations which I have drafted in the past few weeks in
anticipation of one of my daughter’s first visits to the country

I shall run excerpts
from it during February….starting with this -

The
Balkans have for the past few centuries been a source of great fascination for
west Europeans. For intrepid travellers from the 18th century at
least, this was the furthest extremity of the world that they could reasonably
attempt…..The Debated Lands by Philip
Hammond (2002) looks at about 500 books written by these travellers - first at
the motifs of discord, savagery, backwardness and obfuscation which
characterise the 19th century British travel books about the area. “Danubian
Principalities; the frontier lands of the Christian and of the Turk” (1854), for example, is written by a British engineer who found
himself in the land just south of the Danube in what is now North-East Bulgaria
and offers a view just 20 years before Bulgaria was liberated from the “Turkish Yoke”

There
then followed a strand of writing in the late 1920s which, as Hammond puts it, “took the romanticisation into deeper
territory – with a revolt against western modernity and mass society –

From the end of the First World War until the
outbreak of the Second, travellers were finding in this previously depraved
corner of Europe…. " a peace, harmony, vivacity and pastoral beauty in
utmost contrast to the perceived barrenness of the West, and which produced
benefits for those weary of modernity that ranged from personal rejuvenation to
outright revelation”.According to this alternative balkanism, violence
had disappeared from the region, savagery became tamed, obfuscation turned to
honesty and clarity, and the extreme backwardness that had formerly been the
gauge of Balkan shortcoming was now the very measure by which it was extolled.
For many travelers, any mystery that did remain around the geographical object
became less the marker of a befuddled and dishonest culture than a vital
indication of spiritual depth…….”

Meet Bulgaria; RH Markham (1932) (who
was Balkans correspondent of The Christian Scientist) may be seen as an
example. The link gives you the entire book which paints a charming picture of
a rural society – and has a complete chapter on painting.

Undoubtedly the most famous travel writer for this
part of the world was Patrick Leigh
Fermour (generally known as Paddy) whose
trilogy about his walk from the English Channel to Istanbul in 1933 was
finished only last year. A Time of Gifts(1977) covered
mainly his experience of Nazi Germany; Between the
Woods and the Water(1986) of Hungarian aristocratic houses in
Transylvania. But, in 2013, after a 25-year gap, we got The Broken Road(2013) dealt
mainly with the Bulgarian and Greek sections of his trip. Paddy’s writing
is quite exquisite. He led a very full life – a website is
devoted to his memory; and a great biography
came out quite recently.

Rates
of Exchangeby
Malcolm Bradbury (1982) follows a British linguistics lecturer, Dr. Angus
Petworth, on his first ever visit behind the Iron Curtain, to Slaka.

His arrival, the paranoia of his hosts, the
changing moods of his ever-present interpreter and guide, the secret trysts
with attractive female novelists, his increasingly desperate attempts to phone
home and the fall-off-the-chair-laughing diversion into second-division British
diplomatic circles are brilliantly written vignettes that can only be based on
real events.These may or may not of course have happened in
Bulgaria – Slaka ultimately borrows a little from every country once behind the
Iron Curtain – but anyone who visited before (or even immediately after) 1990′s
overthrowal of the communists will immediately recognise much of communist-era
Bulgaria in Bradbury’s book.Especially good are the descriptions of the
hotels: dark wood everywhere, omnipresent men in long coats reading newspapers,
peroxide-blondes smoking at lobby bars, terrible service and Byzantine
bureaucracy.

Imagining the Balkans by Bulgarian
anthroplogist Maria Todorova writes that In
the approach to the First World War specific countries were embraced by
economic and military alliances and some countries acquired what has been
called a "pet state" status.

Todorova sums up as the pet state
approach to south-east Europe as consisting of “the choosing from amongst the Balkan states a people whose
predicaments to abhor, whose history and indigenous leaders to commend, whose
political grievances to air, and whose national aspirations to advocate”. In
this way Montenegrins, Serbs, Greeks, Bulgarians and Albanians were all, at
different times, picked out for laudatory comment.

Drawing on
philosophy, religion, history, psychology and neuroscience, he explores the
things that modern culture is either rejecting or driving us away from:

Responsibility – we are entitled to
succeed and be happy, so someone/thing else must be to blame when we are not

Difficulty – we believe we deserve an
easy life, and worship the effortless and anything that avoids struggle (as
Foley points out, this extends even to eating oranges: sales are falling as
peeling them is now seen as too demanding and just so, you
know, yesterday…)

Understanding – a related point, as
understanding requires effort, but where we once expected decision-making to
involve rationality, we have moved through emotion to intuition (usually
reliable) and – more worryingly – impulse (usually unreliable), a tendency that
Foley sees as explaining the appeal of fundamentalism (“which sheds the burden
of freedom and eliminates the struggle to establish truth and meaning and all
the anxiety of doubt. There is no solution as satisfactory and reassuring as
God.”)

Detachment – we benefit from
concentration, autonomy and privacy, but life demands immersion, distraction,
collaboration and company; by confusing self-esteem (essentially external and
concerned with our image to others) with self-respect (essentially internal and
concerned with our self-image), we further fuel our sense of entitlement – and
our depression, frustration and rage when we don’t get what we ‘deserve’

At that
point I shook myself and tried to get back to the issue in hand – should I buy
a Denon or a Bose? Should it be Bluetooth?

But now I felt
I needed to explain why I was needing something apparently portable when, for
the first time in 25 years, I am no longer nomadic….(.or at least only between
3 locations…….!)

In 1990 I had left the West of Scottish and found myself “on assignments”
– my “user name” indeed on most websites is "nomadron" – and what does my wicked
mind then divert me into? Nothing less than memories of Dick Barton, special agent
to whose radio programme I was, with many millions of others, an avid listener
in the early 1950s!!!

So let’s start again……clearly music is important to me….but, until a
year or so ago, I had been content with simple radio/CD players. The collection
has grown - in all 3 locations I now call home…

But the demise of one the simple music systems called for a replacement
and a simple bit of research and the accident of one of the quality Denon music
system outlets being located on one of my regular beats in Sofia had me installing
it in my mountain house – to my great satisfaction….

Now my ear had a standard of comparison…….I am on the primrose path to
hell……..

My education
about technical options grows by leaps and bounds! The Bose branch at the
Bulgaria Mall in Sofia wasn’t exactly heaving with goodies – and could offer
only a 2 week delivery date for most systems…..And I could listen only to the
smallest – a 19x6 cm Bluetooth Soundlink Mini at 450 levs (that's 230 euros). That didn’t
offer the depth which the larger Denon portable speaker does at 400 levs…..

But there is
another quality Bluetooth option – SoundTouch portable at 850 levs
which also offer at the same price a non-portable version (ie with electricity
connection). The full Bose range is here

A
Technopolis branch in the same (empty and soulless) Mall offered a Logitech 2600BT with 2 subtle cones (connected obviously
but with a fine small white wire looking like Lasagne) and costing (with a tiny
adaptor) only 289 levs…….only problem – the guy couldn’t get it to work……….And,
as the review video says, they’re not really portable……and lack quality
sound…….But interesting….

Thursday, January 29, 2015

Although
some of my earliest political acts (after demonstrations against UK repressions
in Central Africa in 1959 and the nuclear submarine base on the Clyde in the
early 1960s) were about boosting consumer choice (under the influence of Janey
Buchan) I’ve never actually bought into the “consumer ideology” with which
my generation was, I think, the first to be gripped…..

My parents,
married in the immediate pre-war period, enjoyed existential (but not material)
luxury. Money was scarce – my father existed on a Scottish Presbyterian
Minister’s “stipend” (of less than 1000 pounds a year) although we did live
rent-free in a “Manse” owned by the Church of Scotland….

Any spare
cash soon disappeared into the hands of various folk who would come begging to
the house……my father was a well-known “soft-touch”….

He never
owned a car – being a familiar (or “well-ken’t”) figure striding (and pausing
to chat on or pick up paper from) the streets of the shipbuilding town in which
he spent 60 years of his life.

He would
earn some spare cash from tutoring – although it was never clear whether this
was from necessity or love of learning…….

I grew up in
the 1950s – aware of television which was, however, a real luxury. I have a memory of watching (on a neighbour’s set) the 1952 Coronation for a few boring minutes
before being let loose on an empty street and, a few years later (on Saturday
afternoons) my friend Les Mitchell’s set in neighbouring Newton St first the
football results and, in 1963 the first episodes of Doctor Who!

Bliss it
was……..

It was 1966
or so when I acquired my first flat – with 2,000 pounds from my mum’s
hard-pressed savings – and Habitat
furniture…..In 1968 I outmatched my father’s income almost at first go when
I became a Lecturer at a Paisley College. The very same year I was elected to
Greenock’s town council and soon became a Chairman of a major committee.

In celebration I bought a second-hand Volvo
saloon from a lover’s father’s garage…….. shades of John Updike. And,
thereafter, a series of such cars. I acquired my first new car at the age of
47….And my first fitted kitchen a few years earlier……

When, after
leaving Scotland, I transferred the flat (and remaining mortgage payments of
some 20k) to my wife, I had neither savings nor debt……………………verily I was a happy
man!

I have,
since then, accumulated some possessions – one house (for 6000 euros) and
helped my partner acquire a flat in central Bucharest…..But for 25 years I have
rented most of the places I have stayed in – about 20 addresses during the
period…..which is more than 100k in rent – but probably balanced by the absence
of any legal requirement to pay tax…….The nomadic life has meant minimal
possessions…..verily I am a happy man…….

although the
groaning suitcases from Central Asia brought carpets, ceramics and
small stuff…….and, since then, the books and paintings have been accumulating…….in
four separate locations………..and in 1997 I acquired another new car (albeit a modest Daewoo Cielo) which purred happily all over North, South and Central
Europe for 16 years…….. verily I began to sin…………………..

In summer
2013, I blew it……I not only bought a Kia Estate – it was a long-considered
choice…..during which time I pondered other brands such as Skoda……. Verily
I sinned!

This is all
by way of prelude to the tale of my first real consumer search a few weeks ago – for a
sound system for my laptop with which to listen to classical music……

His has been one of the clear and strong voices of economic sanity for
the past few years, using his blog to
great effect – giving us not only analysis but challenging recommendations. In
a post earlier this month, he explains why
he decided to run in these elections. He’s fully aware of the ease with
which honest people get corrupted (in different ways) by office and assures us
that will keep a letter of resignation in his inside pocket for use whenever he
“loses the commitment to speak truth to power”. The problem, of course, is that
he has just become that power!! So his dialogue will have to be with his
conscience!

Paul Mason – from whom sadly we do not hear much now that he has moved
from radio to television – had a recent interview with him in which Varifakous
promised to “destroy
the Greek oligarchy system". In 2010, Varifakous wrote (with fellow
political economics Professors Stuart Holland and James Galbraith – son of the
famous JG) a 12 page modest proposal
for resolving the European crisis…..

We are all very rude about the Greeks – and their role in European
events in the last 100 years gives us every reason to be. Their invasion of
Turkey in 1919 caused massacres and massive migration treks and regional
instability. Of course, Britain’s elite has always had strong Hellenic
prejudices and has consistently been on the sidelines cheering the bloodletters
and oligarchs on……..A long article in November last year gives the detail on Winston
Churchill’s role in the horrific Greek Civil
War post 1944. My gym teacher at school was a Greek communist who was one of many
forced to leave the country because of the violence. His nickname was “Wee Pat”
and I still remember his stentorian voice as he would bellow to those wanting
to be excused the stronger exercises “keep your vest on boy!”!!!

Those wanting to keep in touch with Greek events might usefully use the Macropolis website which
started in 2013 specifically to help outsiders try to make sense of the Greek
tragedy…..

Thursday, January 22, 2015

This is the
fourth flat I’ve had in almost 8 years in Sofia – and it’s interesting what
different perspectives (and indeed feelings) about the city one gets from the
different micro-neighbourhoods. John Berger’s phrase “ways of seeing” comes to
mind. Two were in spitting distance of one another – near the football stadium
(Nikolai Pavlovitch and Khan Krum streets) – each going back to the 1920s….
Patriarch Eftemi Boulevard and Graf Ignatiev
street were the backbone of the area. The very names resonate with history…..Krum referring to the first
Bulgarian Empire; Ignatiev to
the Russian military assistance in removing the Ottoman yoke from the
Bulgarians; Pavlovitch
the most influential of Bulgaria’s early painters.

The third
flat was more modern, Lajos
Kossuth St, just off Hristov
Botev Boulevard – next to a lovely old Bulgarian revival building which
actually houses the Catholic Prelate!
The street names celebrate the power of ideas about independence in the
19th century….

Now I’m in a
charming period flat in the old area between Vasil Levski, Dondukov and
Princess Maria Luise Boulevards – on the edge of the Jewish neighbourhood which
was focused on the fascinating women’s market, subject of an
excellent brief here. Prince Dondukov played (as Russian Governor) a key
role in the drafting of the Bulgarian constitution which was famed in its time
as one of the world’s most liberal. “Stefan
Stambolov and the emergence of the Bulgarian nation” (1993) is a rare book
in the English language about those times…..

The
neighbourhood has rapidly become my favourite…it’s a mere 10 minute stroll up
Danube St (where my flat criss-crosses with Tsar Simeon St) to the magnificent
Alexander Nevski Cathedral behind whose dome Mount Vitosha dominates the
skyline. And then down past the colourful Russian church and the back of what
was the Palace and is now the National Gallery – with its small park area and
statues. The through the little park with the jazz buskers, the National
Theatre and Sofia City Gallery via Vitosha walking street, Levski Boulevard to
the Rodina Hotel where I swim and keep fit.

It was four years ago (!) that I wrote of the joys
of strolling around Sofia which you can experience vicariously in “A Walk in the Street of Sofia Guidebook
“ (Kras Plus 2002) - a marvellous bilingual history of the 6 parts of central
Sofia for those who want to appreciate the city’s singularity by foot. Sadly
I’ve not so far been able to find another copy in the bookshops….here instead
are a few photos I took of the area just 500 metres or so around my flat last
weekend and installed in a newly opened flickr account

Sofia
Enigma and Stigma (Enthusiast 2011) by “dandy” Ljubomir Milchev is a
lovely little ode to the city which contains evocative
black and white photos of old, crumbling buildings in my neighbourhood. Imagine
my delight in discovering, in a nearby magic bookshop on Rakovski
St, “Time and Beauty; art nouveau in the
Bulgarian cities” ed Vittore Collina (2014) – a booklet produced with great
care and thought – a real labour of love.

And it was just a couple of minutes from the Cathedral
that I found on Saturday the most amazing gallery which has been lying waiting
for me for 7 years – the Atelier of Bulgaria’s Grand Old Man of Art, Svetlin
Roussev… but that needs an entry on its own

Thursday, January 15, 2015

I’ve been
feeling a bit guilty this morning – if that is the right word to describe my
feelings on reading of the death from cancer of two figures I knew nothing
about but who seemed to epitomise everything we mean by the phrase “a life
worth living”.

From
curiosity I had punched into an ad for a book released today called “Late
Fragments” which turned out to be the touching memoir of a young activist,
Kate Gross, who died on Christmas Day in her early 30s and who wrote the book
as a celebration of life for her family

I’d no
sooner read that than I hit, completely by accident, a tribute to another
(rather older) cancer victim – one Mike
Marqusee – a journalist and leftist campaigner a typical example of whose
writing can be read in this
article on Red Pepper.

This is
a good review of one of his (short) books about pharmaceutical companies –
which raises the question of what accounts for the huge increase in the number
of deaths from cancer which “developed” countries have experienced in recent
years.

Apart from the
obvious explanation of tobacco, other factors relate to the rise in awareness
and reporting - eg- the
increased emphasis on physical exercise and preventive health care- the
greater publicity which cancer has received- the
increased frequency of medical tests for the condition

But I am
surely not alone in thinking that artificial food additives also have a lot to
do with it.

At this
stage, of course, I should declare an interest. It was at this time two years
ago that I sought a biopsy - which revealed a medium-serious level of prostate
cancer and had resort, in the summer, to a 2 month course of radiation
treatment (in Germany).

That seemed
to do the trick – although I do need to take a daily hormone pill. And, having
read up on the subject, do also try to have daily exercise and (following the
advice of a Professor
Plant) good vitamin input

Our lives
are all too short – Gross and Maqusee both lived rich lives which have been cut
tragically short. Each, in their different way, shows what we can - and should - do with our
life.

RIPpostscriptBy one of these coincidences, I was this afternoon interviewed by a roving TV mike on Sofia's streets and asked how important physical exercise was to me (this after I had explained I did not speak Bulgarian). To the interviewer (and cameraman) 's obvious delight, I then extolled the virtues of the Rodina Hotel; of Bulgarian vegetables; and of daily walking and fitness routines.......... En passant I mentioned my own brush with cancer........

Friday, January 9, 2015

Today’s somber
post is my tribute to the French journalists slaughtered so savagely in Paris
this week.

As
they would surely have wished, it is written in celebration of the courage of
all those who have sought over the ages and in all countries to use their
artistic skills to mock the pretensions of the dogmatists and the powerful. But it is also written in support of the
humanistic principles exemplified by writers such as Voltaire…..

Only
last month I wrote a post Desperately
Seeking….Satire about how much we need satire in these times and, more than
two years ago, had celebrated it in a detailed post as “the
greatest art form”. You will find the posts useful since they try to record
the artists and writers who have risked their livelihoods and lives for
centuries in the pursuit of principle.

In
one of these serendipitous moments of which my life increasingly seems to
consist, I came across, earlier this week in Sofia’s open-air book market, a
copy of a lovely small book about the friendship in the 1930s between
Bulgaria’s most famous satirist and cartoonist, Ilyia
Beshkov and an émigré journalist from Hitler’s Germany.

It
is a powerful evocation (largely from the memory of Beshkov’s widow) of that
period of his life when the vendetta against his cartoons had reduced him to
poverty – but how the support of friends sustained him. You can actually read the
full text of the book here – although sadly not the cartoons.

I
was in the middle of drafting this post when friends here in Sofia contacted me
about the tribute which will take place at 18.00 this evening at the French
Embassy in Sofia.

I
am delighted to be in a position not only to attend but also to have the
opportunity of displaying the poster-size reproductions I just happened to bring
down from Bucharest of 5 Daumier
cartoons – which I propose to inscribe (in French of course) with suitable
text, mentioning Charlie Hebdo, Daumier and Beshkov…..

Thursday, January 8, 2015

I’ve
been busy these past few weeks editing 3 E-books all of which will hit the
world in the next few weeks. I start with Ways
of Seeing …..the Global Crisis which – as has become the template for my E-books – has
emerged from an editing and restructuring of those blogposts of the past couple
of years which have touched on this (very general!) issue. What
follows is taken from the book’s “Inconclusion”

The
table with which the small book starts identifies the various “debates” which
gripped English-speaking countries at least, decade by decade, from the
1930s…through to the present.It’s
impressionistic – so doesn’t try to bring google analytics to aid – and people
may quibble with some of the references. But many who look at it will perhaps
feel a shiver down their spine as they recognise how transitory many of our
discussions have been. The issues don’t necessarily go away – some are simply
repackaged

It
may cover an 80 year period but all the themes still echo in my mind since it
was 1960 when I embarked on my political economy education at Glasgow
University - and the key books of the 40s were still influential. Indeed the
writings which had the biggest impact on me were Europeans from the start of
the century – such as Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, Robert Michels and Karl
Popper. Outside the university, it was the writings of RHTawney and Tony
Crosland which shaped me – and had me joining the Labour Party in 1959;
becoming first an activist; then a councillor; and someone who quickly
developed a rather contradictory mix of corporate management and community
power principles.

I
didn’t know it at the time but I was at the start of an ideological upheaval of
tectonic proportions as the Keynesian certainties began to crumble in the face
of the Hayekian onslaught.For
some reason, however, I chose to focus on regional development although the
ideas of the strangely named “public choice” theorists
did get to me in the early 1970s - through the pamphlets of the Institute
of Economic Affairs

But
it was the social engineering approach of the managerialists which eventually
won the battle for my soul. I vividly remember sitting in front of the radio
enthralled as Donald
Schon delivered the Reith lectures in autumn 1970 under the title “Beyond
the Stable State”. During it he coined
the phrase “dynamic conservatism” - a phenomenon which I was to study for
several decades in different countries.

I read the literature on organisational
change avidly – and tried to apply it wherever I went…John Stewart of the
University of Birmingham’s Institute of Local Government Studies was a
particular inspiration….Policy
Analysis – then in its early days - was an obvious attraction and I enrolled on
the UK’s first (postgraduate) course on the subject at the University of
Strathclyde, run by Lewis Gunn which disappointed for its over-rationalistic
approach – although it was there that I first came across the notion of “framing
theory”. I confess, however, that when I actually had in 2002 to draft a
primer on policy analysis for some civil servants in Slovakia, it was the
rationalistic approach I adopted rather than that contained in the Policy
Paradox book by Deborah
Stone which I only encountered later.

What,
however, the “This too will pass” table doesn’t record is the amazing change
that occurred in the late 1980s in HOW we talked about these various
“issues”…in short the “discursive” or “narrative turn” which post-modernist
thought has given us (see Annex 2 for a short explanation of this).

Although
I’ve grown to appreciate the rich plurality of interpretations the
postmodernists can present on any issue, I’m not quite ready to join their
carefree, fatalistic band…”Whatever……”
does not strike me as the most helpful response to give to those anguished by
the cutthroat actions of those in privileged positions….The
point I have reached is

Friday, January 2, 2015

I
had a dream during the night – that I was at a Conference which was discussing
some sort of national reform but that the only opportunity offered for
contributions “from the floor” were badly structured “group discussions” none
of which gathered any momentum. And, in any event, I didn’t seem to have
prepared any sort of input with which I might have been able to wow the
audience in a 3 minute diatribe…

It
was 05.00 – so I made myself a coffee and thought about “national
conversations”…..Scotland, of course, has just had one – lasting 2
years….thousands (perhaps tens of thousands) meetings to explore its future….it’s
a bit early to draw any lessons from the experience of the independence
referendum (known as “indyref) – although one
at least has tried

What
of the future? First, Scotland has to be understood as more than a series of
competing tribes: Yes and No, pro-independence and anti-independence,
nationalist and unionist, SNP and Labour. The undercurrent of this is an
attempt by partisans on each of these sides and camps to reduce every opinion
down to two perspectives and a politics of two tribes. Everything revolves around
the question: whose side are you on? And who do you most trust to look after
Scotland? Other questions about democracy, the environment, sustainable
economic growth, and how we run public services are lost in this divide, as is
any real space for radical progressive politics.

Secondly,
one of the most positive aspects of the “indyref” was the self-education of
hundreds of thousands of Scots who showed initiative, curiosity and a
willingness to learn and act for themselves, rather than being spoon-fed the
predictable narrow diet of official Scotland. It is this rich practice – of
opening up debate and choices and refusing to accept the stale offerings of
politics, media and power which have historically characterised so much of our
public life – which has to be encouraged and given sustenance.

The
UK as a whole faces a General Election in 4 months….in the last run-up to an
election, an electoral reform movement (The Power Inquiry) failed
to make any dent on the power structure. This time there is not a whisper about challenging the power structure (unless you count Russell Brand's rantings) only talk of “austerity” and “immigration”.

Romania
missed an opportunity to have a national conversation….the November
Presidential elections were controlled by a powerful set of media oligarchs…although a Protestant did rather upset their applecart by winning!The
Bulgarian protests of 2013 did conjure up hopes of reform but became fond
memories after the elections of early 2014……

Of
course I have “form” with such dialogue and discussion! In the early 70s, in my capacity as
Chairman of a new Social Work authority in Scotland, I organised annual gatherings of neighbourhood groups with the local state and business class about confronting the problems of a
shipbuilding town…In the 80s I did the same for the West of Scotland around the
issue of urban poverty…. And, between
2006/07, I prepared a Road
Map for municipalities in Kyrgyzstan

Most
attempts at such dialogue can be dismissed as mere “talking shops” since they
seldom cover the basic economic aspects of life – although I was part of a
small group which came together to start a community banking system in the West
of Scotland in the late 1980s. We started with a visit to the Triodos Bank and, some time
after I had left Scotland, a venture did eventually emerge which I think is now
part of the Community Development Finance
Association set-up. Developing
Strathclyde Ltd was also established in 1993 with similar aims…..Community
enterprise is now an important element in Scotland’s economic life – as can be
seen in the activities of the Social
entrepreneurs network Scotland

In
these crisis times, it’s sad that so few attempts seem to be made to bring
people together for such cooperative ventures – if only for solace if not
solidarity…But people seem to have little energy or confidence left – save for
quick “fix-its”. I referred in September to the
impossible deadline a Bulgarian project was given to deliver a national
strategy when something more like a “Future Search” Conference was actually needed.

About Me

Can be contacted at bakuron2003@yahoo.co.uk
Political refugee from Thatcher's Britain (or rather Scotland) who has been on the move since 1991. First in central Europe - then from 1999 Central Asia and Caucasus. Working on EU projects - related to building capacity of local and central government. Home base is an old house in the Carpathian mountains and Sofia

about the blog

Writing in my field is done by academics - and gives little help to individuals who are struggling to survive in or change public bureaucracies. Or else it is propoganda drafted by consultants and officials trying to talk up their reforms. And most of it covers work at a national level - whereas most of the worthwhile effort is at a more local level. The restless search for the new dishonours the work we have done in the past. As Zeldin once said - "To have a new vision of the future it is first necessary to have new vision of the past".I therefore started this blog to try to make sense of the organisational endeavours I've been involved in; to see if there are any lessons which can be passed on; to restore a bit of institutional memory and social history - particularly in the endeavour of what used to be known as "social justice". My generation believed that political activity could improve things - that belief is now dead and that cynicism threatens civilisationI also read a lot and wanted to pass on the results of this to those who have neither the time or inclination -as well as my love of painting, particularly the realist 20th century schools of Bulgaria and Belgium.A final motive for the blog is more complicated - and has to do with life and family. Why are we here? What have we done with our life? What is important to us? Not just professional knowledge - but what used to be known, rather sexistically, as "wine, women and song" - for me now in the autumn of my life as wine, books and art....

quotes

“I will act as if what I do makes a difference”
William James 1890.

"The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas"
JM Keynes (1935)

"We've spent half a century arguing over management methods. If there are solutions to our confusions over government, they lie in democratic not management processes"
JR Saul (1992)

"There are four sorts of worthwhile learning - learning about · oneself
· learning about things
· learning how others see us
· learning how we see others"
E. Schumacher (author of "Small is Beautiful" (1973) and Guide for the Perplexed (1977))

"The fundamental cause of trouble in the world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt."
Bertrand Russell, 1950

Followers

der arme Dichter (Carl Spitzweg)

my alter ego

the other site

In 2008 I set up a website in the (vain) hope of developing a dialogue around issues of public administration reform - particularly in transition countries where I have been living and working for the past 26 years. The site is www.freewebs.com/publicadminreform and contains the major papers I have written over the years about my attempts to reform various public organisations in the various roles which I've had - politician; academic/trainer; consultant.